Five River Song Ficlets
by Nancy Brown
Summary: River makes friends, has a baby, gets married, and falls in love.  She never did get the hang of doing things in order.  Spoilers up through AGMGTW
1. Only the Beginning

Title: Only the Beginning  
>Author: <strong>nancybrown<strong>  
>Characters: Toshiko, River<br>Rating: PG  
>Words: 950<br>Spoilers: "Exit Wounds," DW series 5  
>Summary: The adventure begins.<br>AN: Written for **spoiler_song**'s Guns N' Curls Ficathon for **alt_universe_me**'s prompt: River/Toshiko, or River+Toshiko, epic and sexy adventures in time and space, (crossover with Torchwood)

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><p>"I'm dead," is the first thing that comes out of her mouth when her lips can move and her mind has fluttered into coherency. Tosh remembers the bullet, slowly ripping through her, remembers the warm flow of blood, and then the sinking coldness as she bled out. Her hands flail for purchase, settling on her midriff, feeling around herself for the wounds she knows must be there.<p>

"You _were_ dead," says a voice, and she turns her head. Her mind still reels, but even as it does, Tosh catalogues the room, details, anything she can use later. She is in a bed, narrow, with a thin but comfortable mattress over a metal frame. Around her, she sees monitors recording information that matches up to her heart rate, respiration, other circadian patterns, although she cannot read the data itself. This is an alien language, one either she has not seen before or has encountered only briefly. She takes a moment to squint at the lettering, hoping to describe it later to Jack. The equipment is designed in an ovular style, all brushed-steel hyperbolae and elegant spheres instead of sharp, efficient corners. She's seen remnants of this particular design before, dented and broken after travel through the Rift, but recognisable.

Finally, she takes a look at her captor. "I was dead."

"Yes." The woman's face is framed in wild blonde curls. She's dressed in a simple khaki tank top and trousers that appear to be all pockets. There's a smile on her lips, but only just. "Bit of a trick to that. I almost didn't get you out of there in time."

Toshiko swings her legs over the edge of the small bed and sits up. Her head is clear. She is in no pain. She has noticed that her eyesight is improved. She holds her own wrist, timing her pulse with the alien display. This isn't some mockery of life, not like Owen, not like Suzie. Owen … "Where have you taken me?" She almost tips her hand on who she is, on Torchwood. No, best to have something to bargain with later. "I have friends who will be looking for me."

"No. You don't." The woman's face is sad, and kind. "Dr. Toshiko Sato, one of the brightest minds of the twenty-first century. Your accomplishments had to remain secret for years after your death."

She let herself take in the words. "How long?"

"For you? About eleven hours. I had to wait until they finished cleaning your body and put you into their little morgue for safe-keeping." Another smile, this one secretive and pleased. "Oh, they did think the locks were good, didn't they?"

Anger moves through her. "You broke into the Hub and stole my body?" There's a glimmer of hope. If she's only been dead less than a day, they can't be far from home, surely.

"And had to replace it with something so your friends didn't wonder where you'd gone. Honestly, I hardly had time to get you back here."

"Back where? Where are we?"

"Come here."

Tosh throws herself off the bunk, letting the anger lead her. Fear is crowding into her throat, and if she lets that win, she'll end up huddled on the floor. She's been kidnapped and listed as dead before. She'll gladly fill this time with rage, burying her terror while she uses every damn technique she knows to get herself home. If she's very good, she can take whatever magic trick this woman has for restoring life, and she can bring Owen back, too.

And then the rage and fear and everything else vanishes as she looks over the woman's shoulder. There's a city, huge as imagination, floating in space. Buildings with familiar names cover it, looking as tall as clouds. Beneath the city, she sees an enormous whale, possibly of the same species as the one they couldn't save a few months ago. Past the city and the whale, she sees shapes she knows outlined on a strange background.

It's the Earth, and it's burned.

Tosh gasps, bringing her hand against her mouth. Eleven hours? All this? "_When_ are we?"

"Much better question. We are far in your future. This is, as you gathered, the Earth. That floating city you see is what exists of the United Kingdom."

Tosh examines the city again, drinking in every detail. Yes. She has seen enough strangeness and wonder of the universe. She can believe this. "Why did you bring me here? As a warning? A message from the future?"

"Hardly. No-one ever listens to the Ghost of Christmas Future." The woman frowns prettily. "Well, except that once. Anyway, no. You're not here to take a message back in time to save the Earth."

"Then why?"

The woman indicates the planet. "You're here to help me save it now."

It's been on her job description before. It's not as much of a shock as it could be; after all, she was dead an hour ago. "Why me?"

The woman indicates a yellowing folder with her name on it, a folder which Tosh understands is anachronistic here in what she's becoming certain is a spaceship. It's open, and she sees a printed report, the standard post-mortem "This is an ex-Torchwood agent" summary of her life. Jack's signature is at the bottom. She's dead. She's really dead, and her body was wiped clean and put into a drawer, and this woman stole her away. Tosh trembles.

"Because I believe that, throughout all of human history, you're the only one who can."


	2. Birth Partner

Title: Birth Partner  
>Author: <strong>nancybrown<strong>  
>CharactersPairing: River/Eleven  
>Words: 500<br>Rating: PG  
>Summary: Every woman in labour needs someone there to be calm and sensible. Sadly, River has the Doctor.<br>AN: Written for **spoiler_song**'s Guns N' Curls Ficathon for **ms_rubiks**'s prompt: River goes into labour. The Doctor does not remain calm.

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><p>"Are you sure?"<p>

River bites down her groan. "Yes, sweetie, I'm sure."

"It's just, you've never done this before. You might be wrong. Remember the Braxton Hicks contractions you had yesterday?"

"Yes. I remember the bloody Braxton Hicks contractions." The pressure builds again, a giant cramp she breathes through. "These aren't the same."

He's doing that thing, the thing where he's playing with his hands, and can't decide if he should be comforting River or rebuilding part of the TARDIS's current console. The console looks to be winning as he drifts back towards the stairs.

"Where are you going?"

"Me? Um. Down there," he says, distracted. "I have to, um, fiddle with one of the settings." His screwdriver is in his hand. If he thinks that damn thing is going anywhere near _River's_ fiddly bits right now, he has another thing coming.

"Just ask her to undelete the medical suite," River says sweetly, though her teeth are gritted. "I'm sure she has it saved somewhere."

"Exactly the setting I need to … " he fades off, and his shoes make loud noises on the stairs. He's so very bad at this, though it can't be easy. He just found out yesterday that she's pregnant, and he has nine months to look forward to of River's body regaining its shape until the night that will put her into this predicament.

Another ripple tears through her, and she can't stop the sharp "Ow!" that escapes. His shoes clatter up the stairs again.

"River! Are you hurt?"

She blinks at him, one hand on her aching back, the other on her enormous belly. He's wearing his stupid goggles again, holding a piece of circuitry that may or may not reactivate the part of the TARDIS's memory they need. He's clearly in over his depth. If she weren't terrified of delivering this baby on the glass floor right here, she'd think him adorable.

"Sweetie," she says as kindly as she can, "go fix the ship. Or I'm going to kill you."

"Right!" he says, and he dives in for an awkward peck on the cheek before rattling down below again. "Just a few more minutes!"

She feels the pressure building again. She glares at the console. "You could be helping, you know."

The TARDIS normally likes her. As River rests her hand, she can feel the slightest psychic tickle, and she suddenly knows the medical suite has been restored, as well as its current location.

"Still working on it!" the Doctor shouts from under her feet. "You keep breathing!"

River glances at the console, and has a distinct impression that the TARDIS has just found the proper "go boil water" busywork for him to do while River does the hard part with the ship's assistance. "I'll be in Medical," she says quietly to the ship, and grunts as the contraction hits.

"What was that?" he yells.

"Good work, dear! Keep looking for that circuit!" At least she can still walk through the pain, she thinks, trundling towards the suite gratefully. 


	3. Gonna Set My Soul On Fire

Title: Gonna Set My Soul On Fire  
>Author: <strong>nancybrown<strong>  
>Rating: PG<br>Characters/Pairings: River/Eleven, Amy/Rory, OC  
>Words: 450<br>Spoilers: up through "A Good Man Goes to War"  
>Summary: Roger has conducted hundreds of weddings, but everything about this couple strikes him as not quite right.<br>AN: Written for **spoiler_song**'s Guns N' Curls Ficathon for **myconstant**'s prompt: Las Vegas.

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><p>Roger has conducted hundreds of weddings, but everything about this couple strikes him as not quite right: she's in a white sundress, with a black plastic gun strapped to her leg and a white Stetson on her head; he's wearing a ridiculous top hat and tails that would look more appropriate on Roger's grandfather. Their two witnesses, who are clearly younger than either bride or groom, are introduced as "the bride's parents," and he doesn't want to know what they're costumed as. Also, they're all English or something.<p>

Whatever.

Roger leads the ceremony, throwing in his standard "Thank you, thank you very much," and "Uh huh," but only when appropriate. He takes pride in his work, unlike those cut-rate Elvises on the Strip. People want to be married by The King, not some wannabe in a sparkly white jumpsuit. He usually gets giggles from his clients anyway, but this couple is too busy rewriting their vows every ten seconds while Roger is trying to officiate. "For richer and poorer" is thrown out, as is "in sickness and in health," but they add "Against Daleks and Cybermen; through history and in future; forsaking all clones, doppelgangers and alternate-dimension versions."

The other two keep throwing in suggestions:

"Through flying sharks and stone angels!"

"You should put 'sickness and health' back in!"

Roger is grateful when they finally reach the part about kissing the bride. He gives them his standard serenade of "Love Me Tender" and wishes them a happy marriage.

The groom shakes his hand wildly afterwards, and hands him a lottery ticket. Great. What amounts to a dollar tip and already spent. Roger shoves it into his jumpsuit anyway. "By the by," the groom says, "he was right. You _are_ the best one. You make him very proud."

"Oh," says the bride, "you knew him?"

The red-haired girl, the "mother" snorts. "No way."

"What?" asks the groom. "He told me when I gave him a lift home."

"Home where, exactly?" asks the man in the Roman getup.

"Lovely little planet in the Nestoria System, it's where bananas originally came from, I go there all the time. Let's drop in for a visit!"

"Not tonight," the bride says, grabbing his arm possessively. "You promised me a honeymoon back in the heyday of Lyros Prime."

"Drop us off first, eh?" says the redhead. "Bit weird, horning in on your kid's honeymoon."

With a wave, the four of them go. Roger's got a few minutes until his next wedding party is due at the neon chapel, and he takes a breather in the front office. Outside the window, he watches the Brits climb into a too-small blue box just sitting there in the parking lot (he also performs drive-thru weddings by appointment, three of those scheduled for tomorrow, busy busy busy).

The blue box disappears as he watches.

Uh huh. 


	4. Fellow Traveller

Title: Fellow Traveller  
>Author: <strong>nancybrown<strong>  
>Characters: Martha, River<br>Rating: PG  
>Words: 600<br>Warnings: off-camera death, destruction and genocide circa TYTNW  
>Summary: Martha Jones was the only person to escape Japan alive.<br>AN: Written for **spoiler_song**'s Guns N' Curls Ficathon for **coffee_mill**'s prompt: the year that never was

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><p>In the last seaside village, Martha delivered two babies and set five broken bones and filled dozens of minds with the story, aided by the translation matrix nestled inside the key around her neck. Everything depends on her, on the words she tells everyone she meets.<p>

She's surprised by what she's found as she travels. Some cities have been taken over by the Toclafane and turned over entirely to technology and industry, working on the Master's timetable. Others have been ignored, the people suddenly thrust back off the grid and relying on their grandparents' means of support: fishing and farming, clusters of communities huddling in terror against the spherical overseers who could at any time come back.

Martha goes where she can, helps and talks and moves on, aching every time. So many of those she leaves behind could use a permanent doctor, not a travelling storyteller who won't be there in a month when the next babies come, when the next plough breaks an arm.

When she crosses the ridge, she sees the woman.

The woman resting casually against a tree has wild blonde curls. Martha hesitates, but she can move slowly, walk right past the stranger if this is one of the Master's minions.

"Hello, Martha," and there goes the thought she might not be seen. Bloody perception filter, she doesn't half know how to make it work when she wants.

"Who are you?"

"A friend. You need to get out of here quickly. He's tracked you down."

"I have a job to do. I'm a doctor."

At the word "doctor," the woman smiles. It's a bitter, knowing smile. She knows the story. Martha can tell.

"You're done here. In less an hour, these islands will burn."

Martha's stomach pulls into a hard lump. She knows these people. She's helped them, with her hands and her words. "I have to go back," she mumbles, turning. She'll return to the village, save whom she can.

"If you do, it will all be for nothing. Japan will burn, they will die, and so will you, and the plan will fail."

"I can't just leave. They're going to be killed." She doesn't even know this woman's name. As she looks, she sees a leather strap on the woman's wrist, twin to the one Martha is borrowing. She's from a future Martha can't bear to contemplate whilst surrounded by the death throes of the world she knew.

"If you leave them now, you can have the chance to save them." It's a mad statement, but the plan itself is mad, and Martha's duty to the world is to create a new reality based on the mad idea.

In the distance, she can already hear screaming. She doesn't want to believe the woman, but she has no choice. She allows the blonde to approach, to place a gentle hand on hers, to activate her own strap. In a flash of light, they are suddenly somewhere else.

Martha feels sick, not just from the transport. "Where are we?"

"Korea. You were headed there next, I believe." Martha nods. The woman steps away. "Good luck, Martha Jones."

"You're not coming with me?"

"Not this time." The woman touches her wrist, and she's gone in a quick, bright light.

It will be days before Martha hears the reports out of Japan. Today, she merely sets her face towards the horizon and looks for another village. There will be babies to deliver, and medicines to administer, and a story to tell. She's a doctor. She will bring healing. 


	5. Inverse Law

Title: Inverse Law  
>Author: <strong>nancybrown<strong>  
>CharactersPairings: River/Eleven (mentions Donna)  
>Rating: PG<br>Words: 550  
>Summary: The first day is also the last.<br>AN: Written for **spoiler_song**'s Guns N' Curls Ficathon for **gidget_zb**'s prompt:

_Well, now,  
>if little by little you stop loving me<br>I shall stop loving you little by little._

_If suddenly  
>you forget me<br>do not look for me,  
>for I shall already have forgotten you.<em>

If You Forget Me - Neruda

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><p>It's in her eyes.<p>

He doesn't often stop to stare into anyone's eyes, too busy with planning his next mad dash to notice, but they are paused here in the lee of a ruined temple, breathing in great gasps, and he's still holding her hand. He picked her up an hour ago, and they've been running for their lives ever since. He finally has the time to look into River's eyes for the merry mischief that pushes him, to take strength from her (he knows at his core that he's a taker, he takes from them all, but he tries to give them the universe in exchange), to find the love shining back at him as it always does.

And it's gone.

Her hand is warm in his. He squeezes, and affectionately, she squeezes back, her breath returned to her. "That was exhilarating," she says, "but next time, let's run before there are only three seconds left on the timer." The teasing is still there, but it's the teasing of one mate for another. She's got the same expression, the same tone, the same kindness that is not love, that Donna had.

He remembers losing Donna, the pain rushing back as strongly as on the first day when he walked away from her.

"What is it?" River's face is drawn in concern, tender as a friend, and he can't bear it. He pulls on his trickster mask so he doesn't have to see her.

"Just a hitch in my side. I'm getting old."

"Nonsense," River says. Noticing for the first time they are still clutching hands, she pulls back. "You get younger every time I see you."

How old is she now? Behind his false smile, he scrutinises her like an artefact from a lost civilisation. Not a single line is on her youthful face. She's got years and scars to earn, and he's watched each one vanish as they meet again and again. He's never let himself consider what else she will lose, though he knows, has always known.

"You should talk," he says, ashes in his mouth.

"Take me somewhere," she says suddenly, her mirth cutting through his looming depression like a knife through soft jam: he's resistant, but she's sharper. "We've saved the day, and you run off again, like every time."

"You do what you're good at." How many times has he left her with a kiss, knowing he'd see her again? He should have lingered with her, should have basked in her love instead of fled, should have known the day would come when she looked at him and saw a mad old man, her parents' friend and nothing more.

She takes his hand again. "Then show me what else you're good at."

And it's there, in the electric charge of fingers sliding between fingers, in the promise of another adventure dovetailed onto this one. She doesn't love him now. When next they meet, she will not love him for forever onwards, unless he breaks the backwards line they've drawn.

But today, this lonely, awful, heartsbreaking day, this is the day River Song falls in love with him. He will treasure these moments. He has that luxury.

"Hello," he says, because it's right, and when she tilts her head in confusion, he says, "Let's go." 

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><p>The End<p>

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><p>AN: As always, my three favourite words are, "I liked this."<p> 


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